HYDERABAD: Jeay Sindh Mahaz-Riaz (JSM-R) Chairman Riaz Ali Chandio has strongly opposed any amendment to the Irsa Act.

Speaking at a news conference here Sunday, he also announced a Sindh-wide protest on Sept 22 and a shutterdown strike on October 20 against government’s corporate farming plan in Sindh.

He said that the lands being acquired for corporate farming should be distributed among poor landless farmers.

He deplored that Punjab had violated the 1945 water agreement with Sindh and executed controversial canal projects with the results that Kotri Barrage downstream flows were not being released.

He said that these projects had destroyed world’s 7th largest delta in Sindh. Mangroves forests have been done away with and sea intrusion’s pace has increased which posed an existential threat to local communities, according to him.

Mr Chandio said that the Water Accord, 1991 was signed during Nawaz Sharif’s government and was violated first during his own party’s rule. He said that in 1994, then Benazir government had introduced a ministerial committee’s agreement which gave more water to Punjab and since 1995, Punjab was getting more water under the formula laid down in the agreement. Then Musharraf and Zardari governments “gave Balochistan the lollypop of Kachhi canal and introduced Thal Canal-I and II project, besides small dams projects.

The JSM-R leader said that since Kalabagh dam was not built, the Water Accord, 1991 had been violated by Punjab in the last 33 years. He said that Sindh’s economy was resultantly destroyed, adding that practically this Accord 1991 had been put in cold storage. Now, he said, in order to snatch lands from Sindhis, in the name of corporate farming, the project of ‘Green Pakistan Initiative’ and amendments to the Irsa Act, 1992 were being introduced. The aim was to perpetuating PPP rule in Sindh, he claimed.

“Sindh has become paradise for outsiders and its resources, right from Kohistan to Karoonjhar, have been looted,” he condemned.

Nawaz Shah Badahi, Dr Khushal Kalani, Amjad Shoro and others were also present.

Published in Dawn, September 9th, 2024